Blog Post

As my blogs have, as of late, been making some unpopular statements, I thought I’d continue that theme today. Recently, I found myself in a conversation with a colleague about diversity and how the church responds to, welcomes, and supports diverse groups and people. My colleague, who’s a wonderful pastor, kept telling me all the ways their church “shows up for diversity.” What was meant by this, was that this church was actively known to people of diverse natures, stations, and identities. The conversation got rather awkward when I -being the pot-stirring type- asked, “Well yeah, but how do you engage diversity?”

<cue awkward blinking>

I look at my own church and other UCC churches in the area and I can see that a substantial number of us “show up” for diversity. We preach about diversity, we support 5 for 5, we are present at LGBT pride festivals, and we march in all sorts of parades for minorities, but is that enough in today’s world? In my opinion, I would say that, most definitely, it is not enough to simply “show up” and attest our support in presence alone. Instead, I think we need to be a people who engage diversity by living with, listening to, working alongside of diverse people and -very often- apologizing for our lack of understanding heretofore.

Still confused as to what I’m saying? Let me try to illustrate…

In Dayton, our LGBT Pride Festival is quickly approaching. Very often, at least for supportive churches, we show up for the festival, have a booth that tells about our church, perhaps march in the parade, and then we head home. We show up and we tell people that we are supportive of diversity, but we don’t really do much to illustrate it within that wider diverse community. “But we’re already Open and Affirming,” is what I usually hear when I bring this point to bear and don’t get me wrong, being Open and Affirming is a wonderful thing. All the same, a substantial number of churches claim to be welcoming -and often are on Sunday mornings- but they don’t engage or come alongside the community they’re welcoming outside of Sunday mornings or random days throughout the year.

Hopefully, by now, you can hear what I’m saying, so I’ll end with something I’ve asked my own church: “Do we really support diversity, or do we simply say we support diversity?” The two are very much not the same.

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One Comment

It’s especially challenging for folks in the pews when “embracing diversity” means risking the discomfort that comes with entering into spaces outside one’s comfort zone—or even worse, yielding some of the comfort zone of the church in order to actively welcome people whose differences from a congregation’s regulars are overt. Yet, the churches that will matter in the 21st century are the ones who can and will do exactly this.